[patio11]

Google's total stranglehold on effective online advertising for firms with less than $100k to spend is an annoyance to me -- I wish they had some competition.

Google having total, unchallenged dominance of navigation on the Internet: that is a threat. You could swipe the URL bar from all browsers tomorrow and most people wouldn't even notice. Turn off Google for five minutes and the Internet stops. Google's ability to do that to individual sites, selectively, at their sole and unchallengeable discretion, has me go from disquieted to terrified some days.

[RyanMcGreal]

Google isn't actively blocking other advertising companies from competing; they're just the winner in a winner-take-all market.

Similarly, Google dominates internet search but doesn't block other companies from offering competing products.

Interestingly, a Google search for 'search engine' does not return Google itself in the top ten results:

http://www.google.ca/search?q=search+engine

[gsmaverick]

And how is this Google's fault? That's more incompetence on the part of many users.